The present invention relates to a sealed type scroll compressor including a compression element having a fixed scroll and a orbit scroll in a sealed container.
Heretofore, this type of scroll compressor includes a compression element having a fixed scroll and a orbit scroll in a sealed container, and a motor element which drives the orbit scroll. The fixed scroll is provided with a spiral groove formed by providing a spiral lap protruding from the end face of the fixed scroll. The orbit scroll similarly has a spiral lap protruding from the end face of the orbit scroll. While this lap is positioned in the groove of the fixed scroll, a plurality of compression chambers are formed on the inner peripheral side and the outer peripheral side of the lap.
Moreover, when the orbit scroll is revolved, the compression chambers are moved to the center, and the volumes of the chambers are decreased to compress a refrigerant.
In such a scroll compressor, to prevent the leakage of the refrigerant from each compression chamber formed by the orbit scroll and the fixed scroll and realize an efficient operation, it is important to decrease a gap between the fixed scroll and the orbit scroll. Therefore, a thrust ring is provided on the back surface of the orbit scroll, and the compressed refrigerant in a compression element is guided into a back surface space of the thrust ring while the compression element compresses the refrigerant to press the orbit scroll onto the fixed scroll, thereby suppressing the leakage of the refrigerant between both the scrolls (e.g., see U.S. Pat. No. 6,146,119 (Patent Document 1)).
However, a problem has occurred that the thrust ring for pressing the orbit scroll onto the fixed scroll has an excessively strong pressing force and becomes worn or that a sliding loss between the thrust ring and the orbit scroll increases.
The present invention has been developed to solve such a conventional technical problem, and an object thereof is to decrease the sliding loss between the thrust ring and the orbit scroll and improve the efficiency of a sealed type scroll compressor, while preventing the leakage of the refrigerant between the fixed scroll and the orbit scroll.